Once Upon This Time

This long autobiographical project was 16 months in the making: the result of a sustained period of self-reflection and the culmination of an important chapter in my jewellery practice. It has been a gesture of appropriation of painful family history through which I was able to grow as a person as well as an artist.

Its humble beginnings lie within what I called an "intervention" in the residency of a fine artist friend and colleague while at the Colchester School of Art.

The photographs which became such an integral part of the installation were originally only meant to be a working tool: the only objects I had decided to take with me to jolt the mind into action during what was meant to be a project confined both in time and space. One day in the School Hay Gallery became three. The photos started not only telling a story, but one which I felt so strongly needed to be retold. It was the beginning of a process of understanding and catharsis of certain aspects of family history which started on a wall as a drawing and ended on a wall as a full installation.

"ONCE UPON A TIME. ONCE UPON THIS TIME"

My grandmother was the original protagonist of my story. A woman whose suffering and regrets I was hoping to rewite to try and erase, at least in thought, the emotional baggage that I still felt was haunting me two generations down the line.

The attempt was futile. In the same way she never wanted her story to be rewritten in life, I was left with an object that did not want to be made. Twice. After its final break, I learnt to listen and offered a visible golden repair as a humble sign of acceptance.

"DE-TOUCH"

Ivory seemed to be the perfect material to embody an emotional burden that, like this necklace, was passed down through generations bearing with it stories of suffering, guilt and regret. Here, it is archived in its own museum case. Unable to be touched and to "touch", it loses its functionality as a necklace to acquire instead that of a badge: a severed yet inextricable part of personal heritage.

BROOCH (copper, inherited ivory necklace, rubber, glass, steel pin)

Photography: Andi Sapey

"DE-LIBERATE"

The metaphor of a humble pebble realising it is significant enough to be wrapped in gold is a simple and open one. But the fundamental element in this piece is the chain. While it appropriates a family heirloom, providing a link to our personal heritage, it can also be detached and worn on the brooch, or it can be fully removed. The key lies in our awareness and availability of this choice.

The pin itself was dictated as much by function as by cultural references. On one hand, it combines the ability to be woven through the gold crochet vessel without soldering and to provide two anchoring points for the chain. On the other, it has the look and feel of an old-fashioned safety pin - a signifier of the familiar and of mending, but also of rebellion and harm.